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Sunday, February 29, 2004 |
ACCIDENT, CARRISOSO, NEW MEXICO
Saturday, February 21
UP NEGLECT AND IRRESPONSIBILITY - UNION PLEAS FALL ON DEAF EARS
For months the Union had been pleading with Union Pacific Crew dispatchers to staff up. Their pleas were ignored. Just 4 days before the NM incident the Local Union Chairman for El Paso received a fax letter from John Marchant, UP Vice President Labor Relations, wherein he stated, “I have been advised that CMS has already initiated procedures to recall several demoted engineers to engine service in El Paso and plans are in place to recall all demoted engineers, if needed, in the near future.”
Too little too late and of course CMS did not do as Mr. Marchant so stated in his letter.
NEW MEXICO INCIDENT KILLS TWO TRAINMEN, SAT, Feb 21, 2004
OUR RAIL SYSTEM DESTROYED BY TWO SELF MOTIVATED MEN
It's time that Dick Davidson and Allan Rutter be held personally responsible for injuries and deaths occuring among our train crews. The FRA and Union Pacific's continued neglect of crew fatigue and deteriorating infrastructure is nothing less than irresponsible. We can only hope that the death of our two dear friends will weigh heavy on both Dick Davidson and Allan Rutter for the rest of their lives...
RRESQ intends to do everything within our powers to ensure that these two self motivated men NEVER FORGET the sorrow they have caused. The ability to prevent these trajedies was held in each of their hands and they both personally chose to ignore it. SHAME ON THE FRA and SHAME on DICK DAVIDSON.
Thank you for your continued support,
RRESQ
www.rresq.com
12:45:36 PM 
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Railroads Run Out of Train Crews ... Again
-- Ron Hume
The nation's large railroads are hiring conductor
trainees in locations throughout the nation. Strong
levels of freight, coupled with short-sighted hiring
policies, have resulted in yet another crew shortage
in locales from coast to coast. The lack of trainmen
and engineers is notably acute throughout the entire
Union Pacific (UP), the nation's largest rail carrier.
Over the last few months on the UP, trains have
been held for lack of rested crews, clogging up
mainlines particularly in the Southwest and
California. While a number of factors have contributed
to the latest crisis in staffing, the phenomenon is
nothing new to an industry which is geared toward
trimming the payroll to the bare minimum. Union
Pacific has been particularly draconian in their crew
management practices, prompting the federal government
in the late 1990s to demand that the railroad hire
more crew member in order to reduce the dangerously
high rate of crew fatigue which UP crews had been
suffering.
The industry will point to an array of factors
which have contributed to this latest debacle.
Intermodal traffic has outstripped projections
recently because of increased container traffic. The
source of this has been traffic diverted from truck to
rail as a result of new regulations upon hours of work
for truck drivers combined with new increased trucking
rates. Also, the economy performed better than
generally predicted in the final two quarters of 2003.
There is some merit to the carriers' claim that these
factors were unforeseeable.
However, other factors, such as the continual
booming of imports from Pacific Rim countries,
particularly China, could easily have been
anticipated. Increased grain loads from a record U.S.
corn crop could have been planned for as early as
mid-summer. And perhaps the biggest factor of all --
increased early retirements as a result of changes in
the Railroad Retirement Act passed in 2001, three
years ago! -- could have been taken into account and
planned for accordingly. Had the rail industry, and
the UP in particular, planned properly in advance for
these retirements, the other factors combined would
not have had the potential in and of themselves to
overwhelm the current train crews' abilities.
So while the industry will once again claim that
the latest crew shortage is the result of
unforeseeable factors, "acts of God", or other reasons
beyond its control, engineers and trainmen know the
truth. For a decade now, railroads have been operating
with skeletal train crews. Beginning in 1985,
railroads began eliminating the caboose from most road
trains, along with brakemen and flagmen. Firemen had
already begun to bite the dust during the previous
decade. Today, most road trains operate with just two
crew members. As a result, the ranks of new engineers
must now be found among the ranks of conductors. But
this system breaks down when the railroad is so
short-staffed it cannot move the trains. To get more
engineers, conductors must be removed from train
service for six months or more while they train for
the engineer position, leaving behind a vacant
conductor job. The railroad, strapped as it is for
both train and engine service personel, can ill afford
to do this.
Ironically, groups like RRESQ (Railroad Employees
Safety and Quality) have been protesting the carriers'
crew management policies in recent years, demanding
that the railroad, the unions, and the federal
government all take responsibility for the staffing
crisis and make the necessary policy and hiring
changes. While the UP in particular has dismissed
out-of-hand the courageous group -- mostly wives and
family members of train service employees -- it would
appear that RRESQ has been right on the mark with
their analysis and predictions regarding crew shortage
and crew fatigue.
Like many industries that work employees in
around-the-clock operations, with no set shifts,
forced overtime and overwork, the rail industry faces
a vicious cycle of its own making. New hires often
cannot and will not accept the harsh working
conditions of constant work, and therefore quit. The
obvious solution is, of course, to hire enough
employees, and entice them to stay with increased
wages, benefits and better conditions. Reserve
extra-boards, seasonal lay-offs, and voluntary
leave-of-absence during slack periods are all methods
that can be utilized (and once upon a time in fact
were used) by the carriers to adequately and safely
staff the nation's freight trains. But Wall Street and
the stock holders would no doubt balk at such a
solution.
Whatever the case, Union Pacific has announced
that it will in fact hire as many as 3,000 new train
and engine service employees at terminals throughout
the country in 2004 to alleviate the immediate crisis.
The railroad also announced that it is suspending
"non-essential" track maintenance projects, to free up
work train crews for freight train assignments and to
free up mainline track for 24-hour a day operations.
It is easy to see that the train crews are, and
will continue to be, the ones who pay the cost -- in
some cases the ultimate cost -- for Union Pacific's
crew shortages and deferred maintenance. On February
21, two UP crewmen were killed near Carrizozo, New
Mexico when their train collided with another on the
single track "Golden State Route" between El Paso and
Kansas City. What role crew fatigue played in this
wreck, as in most wrecks, may never be learned, as it
is a factor often very difficult to measure and
quantify. "The train crew messed up" will no doubt be
the official reason for the fatal crash. But why did
they mess up? The engineer had over 30 years
seniority.
RRESQ is calling upon railroaders across the
country to call their elected representatives and also
the media to report their own experiences of fatigue,
exhaustion, and disciplinary measures they have
suffered at the hands of rail carriers when they dared
to take time off of work for necessary rest. In the El
Paso area following the Carrizozo wreck, Union Pacific
employees called in to TV News Channel 9 with accounts
of exhaustion, long hours of work, and the company's
willfull violations of the federal Hours of Service
Act which regulates crew work and rest.
"Union Pacific is forcing people to go to work
tired and exhausted putting both the the employees on
those trains in jeapordy and the general public in
danger as well," said Bill Hannah, General Chairman
for the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and
Trainmen. The killed crewmnwe had both been members of
the BLE&T. Hannah says a reason Union Pacific
overworks employees is because it is understaffed,
especially in El Paso. Union Pacific has not responded
to these claims.
12:21:08 PM
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